Ranpo jigoku

I also happened to have seen this at the very same Japanese festival in Sydney, and I enjoyed it quite a lot.

These shorts are sick. The writer behind the original stories may have a disturbed and twisted mind for inspiring these disgusting tales of torture and obsession, and love (love which is so alien it doesn't really fit the word).

Of course many stories by Edogawa Rampo have been banned already in Japan for that very same reason.

However, these shorts were great examples of how dark cinema can get. These push right to the boundaries, where sense, reason, and any sort of real point is left behind in its own madness. And it does try to make points. They draw parallels between conscious and subconscious, reality and delusion. The surreal images and narratives destroy the boundaries between the two and the flow freely into each other. The film challenges what art really is. Whether it's a beautiful reflection, a horrific image, or something that is both beautiful on the outside but dead and corroded inside. Here we see that mirrors have the potential to be god, trapping us in its frame. Love is horrific. Horrific. These shorts have the potential to repel you in disgust, or to draw you in and lose yourself in its insanity, and for that reason alone it is a powerful work of art.

The four individual directors obviously had a daunting task ahead of them trying to make this. They had to present these tales honestly, and also visually uncover the madness behind them. I don't know about the former, as I haven't read any of Rampo's stories, however visually these films are amazing too. Especially Mirror Hell, which has amazing shots of the actors constantly reflected in dozens of different mirrors.

You leave the film feeling as if the makers had thrown a lot of violence and sex at you stylishly but with no real substance. The shorts are too surreal and disjointed to follow through with any of the points they try to make. The are no answers to be found in these shorts, and nothing profound to learn or re-learn. However, these shorts were never made with such intentions. They were made to show the madness of Edogawa Rampo. They were made to disgust you, and to provoke you. And they mastered that exceptionally.

Whether you like it or not, you won't forget this one.

One of my favorite horror anthology after Subconscious Cruelty (2000), this film is with 4 different directors adapting a Rampo Edogawa story, like most anthology films it's uneven but still fascinating. The only connector is Tadanobu Asano (from Ichi the Killer) in a different role each segment. It blends David Cronenberg with Heroic Purgatory (1970) & House (1977). The movie has almost gialesco vibes, aesthetically and argumentative. I loved "The Caterpillar" episode which is the most grotesque, bizarre and industrial madness.

Rampo Noir: 4 out of 10: My first though was Zardoz that wacky beyond belief Sean Connery sci-fi film. My second thought was Yoko Ono. Both thoughts along with Johnny Got his Gun and Sherlock Holmes flooded me during the four short stories that make up this J-horror anthology.

First the good news this J-horror is one-hundred percent pasty white ghost free. Yup not an insect screeching wet haired concubine of the damned to be found in any of the pictures. The bad news…. Well let's look at the four pictures.

Mars Canal: 1 out of 10: Naked man in arty picture flashes back at a violent rape while a rare static fills the otherwise mute soundtrack. Yup this was the Yoko picture. Fortunately it's only seven minutes.

Mirror Hell: 6 out of 10: Think Sherlock Holmes but Watson is a dominatrix. Very straight forward narrative and is easily the most accessible of the bunch.

The Caterpillar: 5 out of 10: is the Johnny Got his Gun picture. War hero suffers domineering bride with an over the top amputee fetish. Not as bad as I just made it sound… but close.

Crawling Bugs: 6 out of 10: If this film is ever remade by a Hollywood studio I have two words for the main lead in this segment. Crispin Glover. This tale of obsession over both an actress and the bugs crawling on her skin would make a nifty Showtime Masters of Horror segment. Very arty I could see this both written, directed and starring Mr. Glover who certainly shares the films over the top weirdness.

In fact the whole Rampo Noir movie feels a little like a made for cable anthology series except for the first film that defiantly has NEA grant written all over it. Definitely different but often a little slow and not all that good.

The films have virtually nothing to do with each other in tone and are not strong enough to stand on their own. They do kind of remind me of Zardoz. A film to show your jaded friends who think they have seen everything.

Rampo Noir is a collection of 4 short films based on stories by Edogawa Rampo, the so-called "Japanese Edgar Allen Poe". Rampo Noir is widely uneven, painfully pretentious and at least half an hour too long. Despite these shortcomings, the film does offer its fair share of pleasures - stunning visuals, black comedy and a large dose of Japanese weirdness. Rampo Noir is not a great film but it is an interesting addition to the very small genre of "arthouse horror".

The first of the four films sums up everything that is wrong with the project. A naked man running towards a lake is inter-cut with a naked couple wrestling. The film is silent and partly shown in slow motion. I'm sure there was a deep philosophical reason behind this but I was basically too bored to bother considering what it might be. Even the French would be embarrassed by this exercise in pretension. The next segment, Mirror Hell, is an improvement. For starters, it has sound and a narrative. Mirror Hell is a mystery about a mirror that has the nasty habit of burning off faces. The film is not particularly riveting and some of the special effects are clumsy and not very convincing. The segment is saved by some arresting photography and a wonderfully kinky sex scene between Azusa and Toru, which involves a lot of rope and candle wax.

Caterpillar is the third and, in many ways, most successful of the films at pushing the envelope. This film has an edge that the first two segments are sorely missing. The basic premise of the film is a wife who appears to have amputated her husband's arms and legs in order to save him from going to war. This film explores domestic violence and domination from the unusual angle of a female perpetrator. Caterpillar is an interesting thesis about love in one of its most warped incarnations but instead of shedding light on the issues it puts forward, the film is happy to be a kind of Japanese "Boxing Helena", with its focus firmly directed at shock value and titillation. And it is exceedingly successful at meeting these goals. The scenes where the wife makes her limbless husband eat from a dog bowl and then beats him with a riding crop certainly leave an impression, as does a gruesome scene where she cuts off his nipple. The film also offers a large dose of kinky, limbless sex which is portrayed as vilely erotic. Caterpillar is a nasty little film and Rampo Noir is all the better for it.

Crawling Bugs is the fourth and final segment of Rampo Noir. This film once again explores the idea of how the illusion of love can be the catalyst for the most abhorrent situations. Crawling Bugs tells the story of Masaki, a man who can not bear to be touched by other human beings. This obviously affects his chances with Fuyo, so he kills her and takes her home to be his bride. Despite the multitude of possibilities that this scenario offers, Crawling Bugs avoids the explicitness of "Nekromantik" or even "Kissed", and is happy to be blackly comedic. This is ultimately a smart move as Masaki's vain attempts to keep Fuyo from rotting inject Rampo Noir with some much needed humour and offer some pleasant respite from the sometimes overwhelming level of pretension. Crawling Bugs is visually stunning and very well directed. The gore effects are convincing and the film walks the fine line between the surreal and the plain disgusting with great skill.

Rampo Noir desperately tries to push the boundaries of mainstream cinema but never quite succeeds. In comparison to many of the films emerging from Asia, Rampo Noir is actually rather quaint - with the exception of the large quantity of kinky sex. However, the concept is an interesting one and it offers the opportunity to explore the work of four promising Japanese directors. Rampo Noir is no "Three Extremes" but is worth watching, particularly for the crazy woman with a riding crop.

Uh.. wow. Here's one you will never forget. Four disgusting and insane shorts that seem loosely connected at times (themes of torture, mirrors, obsession, love, bugs, and.. uh.. Tadanobou Asano are in most of the shorts), all lovingly filmed by 4 different directors. Great acting and beautiful visuals throughout and never a dull moment in its 2 hour running time, this film is actually shockingly beautiful and very experimental at times (see the first story which is completely silent) and is just so full of ideas and life that it should be required viewing for everyone who's into cinema that's a little bit different than the norm.

Much more so than the overrated 3... Extremes, this is a film that actually manages to disturb you with its images. Just try getting the images of a disgusting, drooling, dying human caterpillar or a very realistic decomposing corpse out of your head. However, what really sets this film apart are actually the BEAUTIFUL visuals. I can't really describe what makes them so beautiful; you just have to see them.

Completely unnerving and endlessly fascinating throughout, this is definitely some kind of masterpiece that doesn't have any of the monotony that bogs down most pictures of this type. In fact, it's hard to choose a favorite short amongst the 4, because they're all so good! Highly recommended.